teachthe4ps.com - For instructors of marketing.

This is creative — and a lot of fun.  Check out the video.  Coca-Cola and its interactive marketing agency, Definition 6 put this “special” vending machine on a college campus. The unsuspecting students got a lot more than just a bottle of Coke. The promotion fits well with Coke’s recent positioning around happiness and directly targets an important target market of college students. Of course students are more likely than most consumers to check out YouTube and pass along a viral video.  My bet is that this will climb into the viral video top 10 in no time.  In class it could also be shown when talking about Place, if you are looking for a fun example of vending machines.  Enjoy.

Hello and welcome to “Teach the 4 Ps” a blog for marketing instructors and people interested in reading about marketing.  The blog came about after Bill Perreault and I (Joe Cannon) developed a newsletter (Teach the 4Ps) for instructors using our text books – Essentials of Marketing and Basic Marketing.  The newsletter is designed to give instructors current articles, websites, viral videos, and online advertisements – with comments suggesting how they could be used in teaching the introductory marketing course.  We all know our students like current examples, so Bill and I want to provide more for users of our books.  We received many positive comments on the newsletter – so we decided to share our ideas with anyone teaching marketing or interested in marketing.  We hope you will share back – and give us comments and ideas on the blog.

For several reasons, this resource is even more valuable in a blog:

• It makes the newsletter interactive – we hope you will offer comments on our posts.
• We post almost every day – making everything that much more current.
• The blog format makes it easy to find J.I.T. (just in time) examples for your classes.  For example, say are you teaching pricing this week – click on “Price” in categories to the right and you will have a listing of only those blog posts that have something to do with price.

So, please take a look around.  We are kicking this off with more than 80 posts already up.  Let us know what you think?  Do you have ideas about how we might make this resource even more valuable?  Click on the headline above and add your comments (or read those of others).

We have posted earlier on Hyundai’s award-winning marketing program from 2009.  For an update, see this NPR story “A Year After Program, Under 100 Hyundais Returned.”

This neat little article might work well as you teach chapter 2 — and need relevant examples of marketing opportunities.  Many of us in the U.S. (and our students) can relate to an unusually cold winter.  Some brands see this as an opportunity — and not only makers of coats, gloves, and snow shovels.  In this article “Marketers Make Most of Falling Mercury” (AdAge, January 11, 2010 – sorry subscription required, so I am providing a longer post than usual to give you some ideas.  If you don’t subscribe, you might be able to find the article through your library database.)

• Campbell’s Soup increases radio advertising in cities with miserable weather,
• Online retailer Zappo’s promotes coats and boots more often,
• Snuggie reported shortages of their blankets with arms and legs — so it cut back on promotion activities,
• Sales of Ugg boots and electric blankets jumped, too.

At a local level, you can read about what New Orleans businesses are doing in response to the cold spell “Cold snap creates business opportunities for some,” in the New Orleans Business News, January 8, 2010.

Telemarketing tends to get a bad rap.  Yes, I have added myself to the “no call” list to keep my dinner hour undisturbed less disturbed.  But for B2B, well run telemarketing programs can be a key part of a strategy.  When the right customers are targeted, the business buyers are happy to talk to a supplier.  And for sellers, telemarketing (or inside sales) can be an efficient and effective method to generate leads for an outside sales force or close sales and service smaller customers.  This article, “Case Study:  Hewlett-Packard division uses outbound telemarketing for lead generation” (BtoB, January 4, 2010) provides an example of the success HP is having with such a program.

In Basic Marketing chapter 20 looks at cross-functional issues in marketing — “Marketing’s Link with Other Functional Areas.”  Note:  the cross-functional chapter is not in Essentials of Marketing.  This video looks at Mama’s Kitchen, a non-profit that functions as a business incubator in Los Angeles.  This might supplement a chapter 20 lecture with an interesting example of production.  If you like to talk about small businesses in your class, you might find the video useful, too.  Link to the video:  “Build a Business in ‘Mama’s’ Kitchen” (CNN Money, January 11, 2010).

I have to agree with Paul Williams over at MarketingProfs this “Mini Cooper Ad Fires on All Cylinders.“  It certainly grabs people’s attention and generates interest.  The ad also achieves the objective of developing the brand’s positioning.  Just another great example of the fine advertising and promotion work we are used to seeing from Mini Cooper.  Note, if you wanted to show this in class, you could right click on the image, copy it, then paste it into a PowerPoint.

Method has been a very successful brand — showing that a small firm can compete with the P&G and Unilever’s of the world.  Brandweek interviews Method’s founder, Eric Ryan about Method’s controversial viral video and a new laundry detergent.   See “Method Co-Founder Offers Spin on Viral Video, Laundry,” Brandweek, January 9, 2010.  If you decide to show and talk about the controversial video – perhaps from a social responsibility or ethics perspective — this article will give you a bit more perspective.

Check out our previous post on the controversial Shiny Suds video being pulled — you can find the video there as well.

From Wall Street Journal Video, “CES 2010: Lady Gaga’s Deal With Polaroid” January 8, 2010).  This short (0:50) video highlights publicity and trade shows.  If you can’t relate (and my 11 year old told me about Lady Gaga as I drove her home from ballet last night) our students probably know this pop star.

Lady Gaga makes an appearance at CES to promote Polaroid on Thursday. The iconic brand has tapped Lady Gaga to be creative director for a specialty line of products.

This viral video rated number 3  in Visible Measures top 10 viral videos this week — debuting with almost 600,000 views in the past week.  The video features Olympic gold medalists Apolo Ohno (speed skating) and Shawn Johnson (gymnastics).  Shawn back flips (or does she really?) over an oncoming bobsled.  Well done viral videos will be passed around — but do they sell more chocolate bars?  Perhaps some good discussion questions for class.  What Promotion objectives can be addressed well with viral videos?  How?